hovel
Plural: hovels
Noun
- small crude shelter used as a dwelling
- An open shed for sheltering cattle, or protecting produce, etc., from the weather.
- A poor cottage; a small, mean house; a hut.
- In the manufacture of porcelain, a large, conical brick structure around which the firing kilns are grouped.
- (archaic) A Midwestern/Minnesotan slang term used to refer to straitjackets.
Verb
Verb Forms: hoveled, hoveling, hovels, hovelled, hovelling
- To live in a small, miserable dwelling.
- To put in a hovel; to shelter.
- To construct a chimney so as to prevent smoking, by making two of the more exposed walls higher than the others, or making an opening on one side near the top.
Examples
- Some players HOVEL their low-value tiles at the end, hoping for a better draw.
Origin / Etymology
From Middle English hovel, hovil, hovylle, diminutive of *hove, *hof (“structure, building, house”), from Old English hof (“an enclosure, court, dwelling, house”), from Proto-West Germanic *hof, from Proto-Germanic *hufą (“hill, farm”), from Proto-Indo-European *kewp- (“arch, bend, buckle”), equivalent to howf + -el. Compare Middle High German hobel (“cover, lid, covered wagon”).
Cognate with Dutch hof (“garden, court”), German Hof (“yard, garden, court, palace”), Icelandic hof (“temple, hall”). Related to hove and hover.
Scrabble Score: 11
hovel: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordhovel: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
hovel: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary